Paige in Full a b-girl’s visual mixtape Welcome! 2 PaigePaige inin FullFull The State Theatre in New Brunswick, New Jersey welcomes you to the performance of Paige in Full: a B-girl’s Visual Mixtape, a Keynotes are produced by the Education Department of the State multimedia, autobiographical production that is sure to resonate Theatre, New Brunswick, NJ. with both teens and adults. Mark W. Jones, President & CEO These Keynotes provide information and activities to prepare for Lian Farrer, Vice President for Education Online at www.StateTheatreNJ.org/Keynotes the performance and then help you reflect afterward on what you Keynotes for Paige in Full created by Lian Farrer, edited by saw and heard in the show. We hope the experience will spark an Jennifer Cunha. interest in continuing to explore live theater. © 2013 State Theatre See you at the State Theatre! Excerpts from Paige in Full © 2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Find us at www.StateTheatreNJ.org Contents Contact: [email protected] State Theatre, a premier nonprofit venue for the performing arts Welcome!................................................................................................................2 and entertainment. About the Show ..................................................................................................3 The State Theatre’s education program is funded in part by Colgate- Palmolive, Cream-O-Land Dairy, E & G Foundation, Great-West Life & Meet Paige Hernandez......................................................................................4 Annuity Insurance Company, The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey, Hip Hop History ..................................................................................................5 Ingredion, Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies, J. Seward Johnson, Sr. 1963 Charitable Trust, Karma Foundation, The Blanche and Irving Laurie 1980s & 90s Pop Culture: How Much Do You Know? ..........................8 Foundation, McCrane Foundation, MetLife Foundation, New Jersey State The Place You Come From ..............................................................................9 Council on the Arts, The Provident Bank Foundation, PSE&G, and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Their support is gratefully acknowledged What Are You?....................................................................................................10 Funding has been made Finding Real Love..............................................................................................11 possible in part by the New Resources ............................................................................................................12 Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a The Heldrich is the What’s Your Role at the Show?....................................................................13 partner agency of the National official hotel of the Endowment for the Arts. State Theatre. About the Show 3 I wanted a story that would help to reclaim the positive energy that hip hop was once known to create. I wanted a story that was all at once international, and “around the way.” Lastly, I wanted a story for little girls of color. I want them to know that no matter where they fall in the rainbow, their voice is interesting, unique and needs to be heard. —Paige Paige in Full: a B-girl’s Visual Mixtape blends poetry, dance, Short for ‘Break visual arts, and music to tell the autobiographical tale of a B-GIRL: multicultural girl growing up in Baltimore, MD. Written and Girl,’ a girl who dances to the ‘breaks,’ the parts of performed by Paige Hernandez, the show explores how her a song where there are no identity has been shaped by her ethnicity, the places she has words—just the beat. lived, and by popular culture. Paige tells her personal, yet The original b-girls universal story of love, pain, and triumph through the lens of hip and b-boys danced to the breakbeats of DJ Kool hop: a backdrop of hip hop and R&B classics from the 1980s Herc, who is credited and 1990s. She presents her life as a mixtape, with the chapters with creating hip hop of her life combined and recorded like a series of memorable music in the songs copied onto a audiocassette. early 1970s in the Paige in Full explores love in its many forms: Bronx, in sweet, naive, abusive, and genuine. New York City. Personal identity—gender, race, class—is another recurring theme. THE TITLE: MIXTAPE: Paige credits a lot of the show’s Paige in of songs (originally recorded Full is a A homemade Playlist inspiration to her younger brother and on an audiocassette) play on the that contains all fellow performer, Nick tha 1da. “He gave 1987 hip your favorite me a CD of his beats and my creative hop classic tracks. you’d wheels started turning,” Paige says. Nick’s music “Paid in Full” by give a Eric B & Rakim. mixtape to inspired more than 20 characters, 18 poems, 7 DJ someone you sets, and 8 dance routines. like in the By incorporating hip hop music and dance, Paige brings hope that it will help get them to theater to new audiences. “The hip hop experience has evolved like you, too. from records to cassettes; cds, to ipods; and now to the stage,” she says. “Enjoy the visual mixtape.” Meet Paige Hernandez 4 Paige Hernandez (writer, choreographer, performer) is a multifaceted artist known for her innovative fusion of poetry, hip hop, dance, and education. A graduate of the Baltimore School for the Arts, she received a BA in theater and broadcast journalism from the University of Maryland, College Park. Paige is a critically-acclaimed b-girl whose choreography has been seen all over DC and recently in DC/NY’s Hip Hop Theatre Festival with Imagination Stage’s Zomo the Rabbit. As a performer and playwright, she has performed her children’s show Havana Hop and her one-woman show, Paige In Full: A B-girl’s Visual Mixtape at theaters, schools, and colleges throughout the country. With her company B-FLY ENTERTAINMENT, Paige has written and performed original works including Liner Notes, The Nayika Project, 7th Street Echo, and All the Way Live! As an actress, Paige has performed on many stages in the DC metro area including Arena Stage, Folger Theatre, Roundhouse, The Everyman Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Imagination Stage, GALA, Discovery Theatre, and Charter Theatre. A master teaching artist, Paige has taught throughout the country, to all ages, in all disciplines. To date, she has reached over 10,000 students through residencies, workshops, and performances. Her work as a teaching artist has been recognized by the Wolftrap Foundation for Early Learning and Arena Stage, where she received the Thomas Fichandler Award for exceptional promise in theater education. Paige was also named a “classroom hero” by the Huffington Post. Paige is also a hip hop education advocate. She has helped create workshops such as Props for Hip Hop at Arena Stage and Keep it Moving at Wolftrap. The workshops help teachers understand the fundamentals of hip hop as they incorporate the culture into their curriculum. www.paigeinfull.com www.bflyentertainment.com How would you translate your life story from something personal to something to share with others? Would it be through music, dance, theater, art, writing, or something totally different? Hip Hop History 5 The thing about hip-hop today is it’s smart, it’s insightful. The way they can communicate a complex message in a very short space is remarkable. —Barack Obama Human struggle is often the breeding ground for creativity and art. In the 1970s, the Bronx in New York was plagued by unemployment. Businesses and neighborhoods were rundown and abandoned. Young people from poor, sometimes abusive, homes turned to gangs for friendship and protection. Yet from this devastated town emerged a new cultural movement called hip-hop. Its high-energy and fast-beat music and dance helped to bring together communities torn apart by gang violence and poverty. THE ROOTS DJ Kool Herc was one of the first pioneers of hip-hop in the Bronx. His popular parties stood for peace at a time when young people were being lured into gangs. No fighting—or the music would stop. The unique DJ techniques of the Jamaican-born Kool Herc (real name: Paige in Full Clive Campbell) formed the backbone of hip-hop. Herc noticed that the dance floor really came alive during the “breaks” in songs (the part where the music “breaks” to let the percussion section play solo). The DJ cued up two recordings of the same music, then “cut” back and forth to prolong the breaks—and the dancing. When people heard that Herc was spinning records at an event, they came in droves. The best dancers were dubbed “break boys” or “b-boys.” Herc formed his own group of b-boys, added MCs to the mix, and called his new crew the Herculords. Armed with breakbeats and a sound system that was crisper and louder than his competitors’, Kool Herc and the Herculords soon had to move their parties to a large public park to make room for all of their fans. DJ Kool Herc Many Bronx gang members turned away from the streets and headed to the hip-hop dance floor—and the stage. Afrika Bambaataa, from a fearsome gang called the Black Spades, took off his gang colors and put on a variety of records. The music spanned funk, salsa, soca (a modern form of calypso music from the Caribbean), and rock. Fans could expect to groove to the Rolling Stones, a tune from The Pink Panther, and the electronic sounds of German group Kraftwerk—all in one set. In 1975, Bambaataa founded the Zulu Nation, an organization that promoted hip- hop